What the new Missal translations ought to sound like...

As my continued series on the Anglican Patrimony is still being written, I thought some of my readers might care to read and hear aloud what glories neo-Cramnerian prose can do to the traditional liturgy. This morning, I received an email from a professor friend of mine at Ave Maria University who wanted me to translate an old prayer from the Rituale for the blessing of a soldier first going off to war (originally, as is clear from the wording of the prayer, off to one of the Crusades) into the idiom of the BCP. For those of you who read Latin, I include it also:

Deus, cunctorum in te sperantium protector, adesto supplicationibu nostris, et concede huic famulo tuo qui sincero corde gladio se primo nititur praecingere militari, ut in omnibus galea tuae virtutis sit protectus: et sicut David et Iudith contra gentis suae hostis fortitudinis potentiam victoriam tribuisti, ita tuo auxilio munitus contra hostium suorum saevitiam victor ubique existat, et ad sanctae ecclesiae tutelam proficiat; per Christum Dominum nostrum. Amen.

O God, the guardian of all them that put their trust in thee, mercifully accept our prayers and grant that this thy servant, who with heart unfeigned striveth to gird himself with a sword of battle for the very first, may in all things be protected by the helmet of thy might; and, as Thou of old didst grant the victory unto David and Judith against the face of the enemies of their race, so, defended by thine aid, may he arise in all places the victor against the rage of his foes and advance the safeguard of thy holy church, through Christ our Lord. Amen.

All of us literati must bemoan that the Pauline Missal is not now being translated into this sort of English, for if we are going to pray in English, it should (of course!) be this English, as I'll make clear in a future post. But we can hope and pray that when the Novus Ordo turns 80 (in Advent 2049) maybe translations like this will be mandated for Latin Rite parishes everywhere. A noble cause for which to pray, fast, and do penance!